Factory comes with a ready-to-play month, December, but you can also use the built-in editor to create your own months.
To start from scratch, simply select New from the File menu. You will be given a standard file dialog for creating files. Note that the file name is taken to be the name of the month, so a name such as January, August, or Thermidor is suggested.
You can also open an existing month for editing, but you may be required to enter a password before making changes.
Once you have a month open, you can begin constructing factories and designing products by selecting Calendar... or Components... from the Edit menu.
- Any changes you make to the month are saved automatically.
EDITING COMPONENTS
Before you start building factories, you have to decide what sort of products you are going to build in them. If you select Components... on the Edit menu, you will be able to create and edit your own product components. A component palette will appear with which you can view components and select them for editing.
Components are grouped into families of 15, and each workday has a single family associated with it. Thus, a family must contain all of the components and combinations of components (including trash and the finished product) which will be used in a given workday. You can page through the families by clicking on the left and right arrow buttons on the selection palette.
For example, consider the components required for the factory in which shoes are placed in a box. Five components are necessary: the shoes, the box, a box containing shoes (the finished product), a trashed pair of shoes, and a trashed box.
Each component has two parts: an image and a combination table that defines how the component interacts with other components. These are described in the sections which follow.
The Components Menu
While selecting a component to edit, the Components menu appears on the menu bar. It contains the following commands:
New Family - Create a new family of 15 blank components.
Copy Template - Place a PICT containing a template of all component images in the currently selected family on the Clipboard.
Paste Template - Copy a PICT component template onto images of currently selected family. (See below for more information).
When you are done editing components, click on the OK button on the component palette or press Return.
Copying and Pasting Image Templates
Factory contains a simple graphics editor (described in the next section) for drawing component images, but you may want to use your own paint program. Graphic templates provided a simple way of transferring families of component images between Factory and other applications.
A template is simply a picture which contains a grid of 15 cells corresponding to the items on the component palette, each containing a component image. When you choose Copy Template from the Component menu, a template is placed on the Clipboard. You can then switch to a painting application and paste in the component template.
- If you are running under System 6.x and are not using MultiFinder, you will have to copy the template into the Scrapbook, quit Factory, open a painting application, and paste the template in from the Scrapbook.
For more information about the Clipboard, Scrapbook and switching applications, see your Macintosh documentation.
Once you have the template in your paint program, you can edit the images within the cells. You should use the Apple color palette (16 or 256 colors) if possible.
When you are done editing the images, select the entire template (including the frame) and copy it. See your paint program manual for more information on selecting and copying.
Now, switch applications back to Factory and choose Paste Template. The new images will appear on the palette and you will be asked to verify that they are acceptable. If you do so, the images become the images for the current family.
- If you leave a cell in the template blank (all white pixels within the frame), it will not be pasted onto the component family. Whatever image existed in the corresponding place will remain undisturbed.
- Make sure the template is exactly the same size it was when you initially pasted it. If it is not, Factory will not recognize it as a valid template when you choose Paste Template.
Editing Component Images
In addition to using a paint program as described above, you can draw component images with Factory's built-in paint editor. If you click on a component in the component palette, the Image dialog appears.
You will see a fatbits (blown-up) picture of the component's image and an actual-size image, as well as a few painting tools. If you are familiar with other Macintosh painting programs, use of these tools should come naturally to you. The tools can be selected by simply clicking on them:
Pen Tool - Draws where you click in the component image.
Eraser - Use this tool to erase dots in the image.
Selection Tool - You can use this tool to manipulate rectangular sections of the image. (See below).
Color Sampler - Use this tool to sample a color from the image and make it the current drawing color. To access this tool, hold down the Option key when the pen tool is activated.
If you are using color, you can select a drawing color from the palette on the right of the image. The current drawing color is displayed in a box below the Eraser tool.
Manipulating Selections
The selection tool allows you to manipulate rectangular sections of the image. To use it, click and drag across the part of the image you want to select. A frame will show you how much you have selected. When you release the mouse button, the selection region will be outlined.
You can use commands from the Edit menu in conjunction with the selection.
Undo - Undo the last drawing operation performed.
Cut - Deletes the selection and places it on the Clipboard.
Copy - Places a copy of the selection on the Clipboard.
Paste - Copies the contents of the Clipboard onto the image. If a selection is active, the Clipboard image is scaled to fit inside the selection.
Clear - Deletes the selection.
Select All - Select the entire component image.
You can also move a selection around by dragging it (a hand appears to indicate that you can grab the selection).
- If you hold down the Option key when you go to drag a selection, a copy of the selection will be left in its original position.
You can copy and paste selections within the same image, between different images, or between applications (using the method described above under "Copying and Pasting Templates").
If you check the box at the bottom labeled Waste, the current component will be considered waste during game play. If you click on the button labeled Combinations, you will move to the Combinations dialog (see "Creating Combination Tables" below).
When you are done editing the component image, click on the OK button or press Return.
Creating Combination Tables
If you click on the Combinations button on the image editing dialog, you will go to the combination table dialog.
- You can skip directly to the combination table by holding down the Option key while you click on a component in the component selection dialog.
A component's combination table determines how it combines with other components. Components combine by a simple rule: A + B = C. A is the current component, while B and C can be set in the combination table. B is the additive component which might be another component which drops onto a from a gate or storage tank, or it might be a layout fixture through which the component passes. C is the resultant component.
For example, if the current component is the box from the previous shoe example, the additive component would be a pair of shoes, and the result would be a box with shoes inside of it. (You might want to distinguish the full box from the empty box by drawing it as a closed box or with a company logo on it.)
To place an item in the combination table, simply click on the desired cell. You will be given a palette of components to choose from. If you are clicking on an additive cell, you can alternatively choose from a page of layout fixtures which you may want to affect the component. For example, a pie might turn into a baked pie if it is combined with (goes through) an oven.
There are four possible entries on the combination table. A fifth entry has a question mark for the additive component. This is the default combination, representing any combination not provided for in the table. This is normally a trash component, by convention the last component in the family. Leaving the default resultant as some kind of trash insures that components will only be able to combine in the ways specified in the combination table.
If you check the box at the bottom labeled Waste, the current component will be considered waste during game play. If you click on the button labeled Image, you will move to the Image dialog (see "Editing Component Images" above).
When you are done editing the combination table, click on the OK button or press Return.
EDITING THE CALENDAR
Once you have created a family of components, you can proceed to create a factory which will assemble them.
If you select Calendar... on the Edit menu, Calendar dialog will appear. If you are editing a new month, the calendar will be empty; otherwise, the calendar will display products on workdays much as it does in the course of normal play.
Below the calendar are 5 buttons which allow you to change aspects of the current month: Password, Days, Move, Edit, and Test, Their functions are described below.
When you are done editing the calendar, click on the OK button or press Return.
Setting Passwords
If you click on the Password button, you will be able to set password protection for the current month.
Once a password has been set for a month, no one will be able to access editing functions without entering the password first. This prevents players from altering factories to make them easier. When a player successfully meets their quota for the last day of the month while playing the game, the password protection is removed.
Newly created months do not have passwords and you probably won't want to set it unless you're ready to distribute your month to others. If you set a password and want to remove it, simply delete the text if the Password text box.
- Warning: If you set password protection, DO NOT forget it! Writing it down in the back of this manual is advisable. Note that passwords are case-sensitive.
Setting the First and Last Days
If you click on the Days button, you will be able to set the first and last days for the current month.
You will first be asked to click on the day you wish to be considered the first of the month and then that which should be the last day of the month.
- You cancel any such operation which asks you to select a day on the calendar simply by clicking anywhere outside of the calendar.
Although normal months have between 28 and 31 days, Factory's months can be of any length up to 33 days. Note that since no work is done on weekends, so this means that there are a maximum of 25 actual workdays (5 weeks x 5 days) in a given month.
If you shorten a month, some workdays may disappear . These workdays are not erased, but are simply not displayed in the editor or during game play. This allows you to temporarily hide some workdays which may be under development. To re-display them, simply lengthen the month using the Days button.
Reordering Workdays
If you click on the Move button, you will be able to alter the order in which workdays appear on the calendar.
You will first be prompted to click on the workday you wish to move and then for where you want it moved. Note that both of these must be between the first and last days of the month.
- Normally, the day you select will be inserted at the specified position, but if you hold the Option key down during this operation, the two selected days will simply be swapped.
Testing a Workday
If you click on the Test button, you will be able to select a workday you wish to take on a trial run.
Normal game play will begin on that workday. When the workday ends for whatever reason, you will be returned to the calendar dialog.
EDITING A WORKDAY
If you click on the Edit button in the Calendar dialog, you will be asked to select a workday to edit.
Once you do so, the Workday dialog will appear. It displays information about the selected workday such as company name, goal product, quota size, shipment size, and difficulty rating. All of these can be altered as described below:
Company Name is simply the name of the company for which the player works on the current workday. The default company name is Acme.
Goal Product displays what is to be produced in the current workday. To alter it, simply click in its box, and you will be given the selection palette. Here you may choose any component from any family of components you have created.
- Once you choose a component as a goal for a particular workday, its family becomes the family for the workday. If you later change to a goal product from a different family, you will probably have to redo most of the settings for the workday.
If no product has been selected, or if you press Clear on the selection dialog, a gray square is displayed. A workday will be ignored during game play if no product has been selected.
Quota and Shipment display the current workday's quota and the maximum shipment sizes. The quota is the number of finished products the player must get into the truck in order to advance to the next workday; the shipment is the number of items of any kind that will fit in the truck. These should be between 1 and 30, and the quota should be less than the shipment.
Difficulty displays the difficulty rating of the current workday. This effects how much the player is paid or penalized at the end of the day - a higher difficulty means higher stakes. It should be between 1 and 10.
- If you enter unacceptable values into any of the fields, they will be adjusted when you leave the dialog.
The workday dialog also has six buttons which allow you edit other aspects of the workday: Layout, Storage, Inputs, Text, Assembly. These functions are described in the sections which follow.
Constructing Factory Layouts
If you click on the Layout button in the Workday dialog, you will be able to edit the layout of the current workday's factory layout.
The factory layout will be displayed along with a palette of factory fixtures. If you click on a fixture in the palette, it becomes the current fixture (which is displayed in the topmost palette cell). This fixture will be placed in any layout grid cell on which you subsequently click. There are several pages of fixtures which you can flip through using the palette's arrow buttons or by using selections on the Layout menu .
- To make a fixture in the layout the current palette fixture, hold the Option key down and click on the desired layout item.
- To erase an layout grid cell, hold the Shift key down and click on it.
- You can fill or erase a multiple cells by holding the mouse button down while moving the cursor.
- If the fixture palette is covering a part of the layout which you want to work on, move the palette out of the way by dragging on its title bar.
Placing Factory Fixtures
Many fixtures contain a conveyor belt, the direction of which is indicated by an arrow on the fixture. (If you are running in 256 color mode and select the Animate Editing option on the Layout menu, you will actually see the belts moving in the correct direction). Selecting Change Belt Direction from the Layout menu will switch the direction of all belt-fixtures in the palette, allowing you to place conveyor belts going in both directions.
- You can also switch directions by clicking on the current fixture in the fixture palette.
You can place one truck at the left or the right side of the screen by clicking on the little truck icon (located at the bottom of the Gates & Girders fixture page). The direction of the truck in the palette toggles along with the conveyor belt direction. Note that the entire truck will not be drawn on the editing screen. Rather, the truck icon will be drawn at the point at which components actually enter the truck. Note that unlike other fixtures, you cannot control where the truck is placed; it goes in the same spot regardless of where on the layout you click.
Factory layouts have two layers, a foreground and a background. Fixtures in the background have no effect on game play; a few pages of background fixtures are provided to add variety to factory layouts. Some background fixtures cannot be placed in a two-square margin around the sides and bottom of the layout.
Integrity of Layouts
The editor enforces the integrity of factory layouts. This means that you will not be able to save layouts which might cause components to behave in unnatural ways. For example, objects shouldn't be able to fall off of the bottom of the screen, and they shouldn't find conveyor belts going in opposite directions. Note that the editor is concerned only with paths along which components could conceivably travel.
When you finish editing the factory layout, a check will be made to see if the layout is acceptable. If it isn't, you will be forced to either continue editing the layout or revert to the layout before you began editing. You will not be able to exit with (and thereby save) an invalid layout. If you select Check Layout from the Layout menu, the editor will indicate exactly what and where the problem is.
In general, a layout must meet the following criteria:
- It contains no unnatural component paths.
- It has a path leading from the supply pipe to the truck or a truck pipe.
- It contains exactly one clock and one supply pipe.
- It has fewer than 15 storage tanks.
The Layout Menu
While editing the Assembly Guide, the Layout menu will appear on the menu bar. It contains a list of the fixture pages which allow you to turn directly to a specific page in the fixture. It also contains the following commands:
Foreground - Toggles display of the foreground layer.
Background - Toggles display of the background layer.
Animate Editing - Toggles the animation of conveyor belts during editing. This option is only available when using 256 screen colors.
Change Belt Direction - Toggles the direction of conveyor belts in the palette.
Check Layout - See where problems lie in the current layout.
Revert Layout - Restore the layout to how it was when you began editing it.
Clear Layout - Start over with a blank layout.
When you are done editing the layout, click on the OK button on the fixture palette or press Return.
Setting Storage Tank Types
If you click on the Storage button in the Workday dialog, the Storage Tanks dialog appears. This allows you to set storage tanks to store components.
The dialog displays five storage tanks and the type of component each one stores. To set a tank to store a particular component, simply click on the cell adjacent to it and choose from the components on the component selection dialog. Once you do, the tank will be labeled with a small picture of the component which it stores.
- Although each workday is limited to a maximum of 5 different types of storage tanks, a factory layout can have as many as 15 total storage tanks, regardless of type.
You can also set the number of items which are to be considered a unit within the tank. This will usually be 1, but can be set to 2 or 3. Setting the number to 2 means that the storage tank will not activate a press below it until 2 items have been placed in the tank.
When you are done setting the storage tanks, click on the OK button or press Return.
Setting the Input Queue
If you click on the Inputs button in the Workday dialog, the Input Queue dialog will appear. The input queue sets the order in which components flow into the factory through the supply pipe.
You will be presented with a dialog containing ten cells which represent a position on the input queue. The component in the leftmost cell will enter the factory first, the next one will be next, and so on. The queue 'wraps' around from the right end and starts at the left again.
You can place components in the cells by clicking on them and choosing from the component palette.
You can also set the level of randomization in the input queue with the radio buttons on this dialog box. With no randomization, components will be chosen from the input queue in sequence from left to right. As the randomization increases, the likelihood of components appearing in the specified queue order decreases.
Empty cells in the queue are ignored. You can make a cell empty by clicking on it an choosing Clear from the component palette.
When you are done setting the input queue, click on the OK button or press Return.
Editing Introductory Text
If you click on the Text button in the Workday dialog, the Introductory Text dialog appears. This allows you to edit the text which appears to the left of the calendar at the beginning of the workday.
The text appears in two sections which should be kept fairly brief. By convention, the first section should describe the company and product of the current workday, and the second should offer tips on how the player should assemble the components.
- All text entries are limited to a maximum of 255 characters. However, it is unlikely that more than this number would fit in the spaces provided.
When you are done editing the text, click on the OK button.
Creating the Assembly Guide
If you click on the Assembly button in the Workday dialog, the Assembly Guide dialog appears for you to edit. The Assembly Guide visually explains to the player how components should be put together during the current workday. By convention, the logical flow of the guide should be from left to right.
You will be shown the grid of cells which comprise the Assembly Guide and a selection palette. If you click on a component in the selection palette, it becomes the current component (which is displayed in the topmost palette cell). This component will be placed in any assembly grid cell on which you subsequently click.
- To make an item in the Assembly Guide the current palette item, hold the Option key down and click on the desired assembly item.
- You can paint or erase a multiple cells by holding the mouse button down while moving the cursor.
- If the selection palette is covering a part of the Assembly Guide which you want to work on, you can move the palette out of the way by dragging on its title bar.
There are two alternate pages of assembly components which contain cues to assist you in communicating the way in which components should be assembled. Click on the palette's arrow buttons to switch pages or use the selections on the Assembly menu as described below.
The Assembly Menu
While editing the Assembly Guide, the Assembly menu will appear on the menu bar. It contains selections for quickly accessing any of the three pages in the assembly palette as well as the following commands:
Shift [direction] - Nudges all elements on the guide in the specified direction. Use to center the guide or make room for additional instructions.
Clear Assembly Guide - Start over with a fresh Assembly Guide.
- Warning: If you nudge items off of the edge of the guide, they are immediately lost.
When you are done editing the Assembly Guide, click on the OK button on the component palette or press Return.
DISTRIBUTING MONTH FILES
Factory's editor allows you to create your own month files. If you choose to do so, you are welcome to share the file with others. You should probably set password protection on the month so players can't cheat by editing their way through harder levels.
If you do distribute a month file, you must not do either of the following:
- Distribute any of the files which came on the disk in the Factory package.
- Remove or alter copyright notices embedded in the month files.
Doing either of these is a violation of you license agreement for the use of Factory. If someone else wants to play a month you have created, they will have had to have registered their own copy of Factory.
TECHNICAL NOTES
- You must have the fonts 10 & 12 point Geneva and 12 point Courier installed in order for all of Factory’s text to display correctly. Refer to your Macintosh Documentation for help on installing fonts.
- There are three ‘Graphics”’ files installed with the game, but you only need the one corresponding to the color mode in which you will be playing. For example, if you know that you are going to play only in 16 color mode, you can throw the files ‘Black & White Graphics’ and ‘256 Color Graphics’ in the trash.
- You can also safely throw away the ‘Sound’ file if you are planning on playing without sounds.
- If you experience System Errors or other unusual behavior while running Factory, try disabling some or all of you INITs. Refer to your Macintosh Documentation for more information.
- If you’re playing in Black & White or 16 color mode, you can reduce the memory allocation in Factory’s Get Info window; the memory size suggested is for users running in 256 color mode. If you’re playing in Black & White, you can set the memory size down to 600k; in 16 color mode you can reduce it to 800k. Setting smaller memory sizes than are suggested here will probably make your system crash. Unless you are experiencing memory shortages, you should probably keep the default setting of 1200k.
- I can be reached via email at pcal@agora.rdrop.com. If you can access the World Wide Web, go to http://www.rdrop.com/~pcal/factory for the latest information.
